


Let Her Go

by Naturally_Quiet



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-27
Updated: 2015-04-27
Packaged: 2018-03-25 23:56:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,001
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3829603
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Naturally_Quiet/pseuds/Naturally_Quiet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Solas, what Lavellan was to him, and what he had to do.</p><p>*basically follows DA:I plotline*</p>
            </blockquote>





	Let Her Go

**Author's Note:**

> http://red-riding-hood-half-werewolf.tumblr.com/post/109922017797/let-her-go
> 
> Originally uploaded on my tumblr, decided to move it here. Enjoy!

 

He can't stop looking at her. 

 

It's little things at first: the contours of her hands, the shift of her hips, the sleek point of her ears. And then it's her smile, her face, her stolen glances up at him. 

 

Her kiss was the first strike.  

 

Had it not been in his Fade, would he have been so brash, so hungry? He hadn't gathered his senses all the way when he awoke. But when she came to him, sweet and surprised, his boldness came back. "Sleep well?"

  

The second strike was of his own volition.

 

He wanted to stay. Logic and reason be damned, just this once. Her hand held him at the bottom of the ocean, "Don't go."

 

He didn't give himself time to hesitate. Oh, logic and sweet reason, damn you both! "It would be kinder in the long run. But losing you would..."

 

Her kiss was fire and smoke. Her breath was in his lungs and he burned from the inside out. It didn't make sense, but it didn't need to. He didn't  _want_  it to. She was anchor and ocean and fire and smoke and none of her made any  _sense_. But he loved it so much, loved her so much. If he stayed any longer, he might've said more than he meant to. "Ar lath ma, vhenan." He meant that, though.

 

It was then that he realized he was drowning.

 

But after Halamshiral, after the Arbor Wilds, he was ready. Ready to tell her how she died, how she lived, how he saved her, and how they really came to be. How he was not quite who he said he was. That's the part he feared the most. But how ever much he feared it, so much had to be said, had to be spoken.

 

The third strike was all on him, too. The worst strike.

 

He was just staring at her, waiting. What were words now? He'd confessed; he'd spoken his love. And there, those words hung in the air. He didn't expect her to feel the same, but she did. And that--

 

That was the moment he failed. If only he'd just opened his mouth a bit more! If he'd taken his truth about her and continued to pull that string out of his mouth! He could have unknotted his lie! He should have  _just_ \--! But it's too late and ink flows from his lips and he speaks another truth; not the one he was looking for, no. But a truth.

 

Her complete trust in him erased his worry. "Ar lasa mala revas. You are free."

 

He didn't just mean she was free from the marks that had marred her face, but she was free from everything. All he needed was her. Everything else just didn't matter. "You are so beautiful."

 

Her fire only strengthened that feeling of contentment. He was hers and she was his and everything else was irrelevant and unnecessary and he was about to let go because the People have done fine thus far _they'll be okay he can stop he can be with her they'll be okay ~~theywillbeokay~~_

 

Then there's fur and fangs and howling at the high moon and primal instinct. Solas crushed it. Solas tried to crush it.  _Fight it._  But this was not him. This was not Fen'Harel. 

 

_The People need him._

 

_Let her go._

 

And she pulled away to breathe and the first words that fly out of his mouth, "And I am sorry. I have distracted you from your duty. It will never happen again."

 

"Solas..."

 

  
_She said his name_  and he hesitated again, reached out for her again, but dug his heel into the ground and stopped himself. He was straining and he knew she saw. "Please, vhenan."

 

"Solas... don't leave me. Not now. I love you."

 

This wounded him. This  _wounded him_. He could not help but blurt the truth once more. "You have a rare and marvelous spirit. In another world--"

 

"Why not this one?" Her eyes were filled with tears. She reached for him, cried out for him.  _She needed him._

 

He couldn't stay. She's pleading with her eyes, her frame trembling. He wanted to hold her, wanted to apologize, but he wanted to scream at the sky. His heart had chains she could not remove. Oh, but how he wished she could! He had to do this alone.  _The People need him._  "I can't. I'm sorry."

 

His night alone was long, his sleep fitful. He missed her anchor and ocean, her fire and smoke. He missed her. In his dreams, she was sand, slipping between his fingers.

 

The out. The final push back, final fight. 

 

The after. 

 

At least, there should have been an after. But it was muddled, messed up. His prized foci, broken; his fragile heart, shattered; the love of his life, apologizing. Why? "It is not  _your_ fault."

 

"There's more, isn't there?"

 

"It was not supposed to happen this way." The words were true. It wasn't supposed to happen this way. He was supposed to get the orb back from Corypheus, supposed to tell her everything and unveil the truth. He promised everything would be made clear after they dealt with their enemy.

 

Corypheus is dead.

 

Yet things were still cloudy, hazy and hectic. He had failed.

 

"No matter what comes, I want you to know that what we had was real." The force he used to say these words could have crushed a mountain. He loved her, he did. But he could not delay the inevitable; his path of solitude must start somewhere.

 

The way she said his name nearly tore him apart, such confusion and fear; he almost turned back. But Cassandra drew her attention away from him. And she left, expecting him to follow.

 

The out. The after.

 

There was only one out, and there was no after.

 

The only after, the only answer in his ear  was the whisper in the winter wind. The only comfort to his grief was her name. 


End file.
